It’s that time of year again, when athletic directors fend off angry mobs of college basketball boosters with their canned “we’ll evaluate the coach at the end of the year” spiel. That’s administratorspeak for “Psst! The search committee’s at work, folks. Give me time.”
However, there’s a different mantra around college basketball right now. The Grim Reaper is looking more like Mother Teresa. ADs at basketball disasters such as DePaul, Virginia and St. John’s are coming out and saying, “He’ll be back.”
No one really knows why. Cynics don’t believe it. Still, that’s a long way from saying, “We will look at the basketball program at the end of the year just like we do all programs at our fine institution.”
We’ll see. With only two weeks left in these guys’ seasons, here’s a look the coaches on the hot seat (in alphabetical order):
Ernie Kent, Oregon, 12th season, 7-20, 1-14 Pac-10, 218-154 overall. Believe this: AD Pat Kilkenny has wanted to fire Kent since the beginning of the season and hire his good buddy at Gonzaga, Mark Few, an Oregon native. Now Kilkenny has an excuse. The Ducks are well on their way to their worst season since going 6-20 in 1971-72, and he has a new state-of-the-art arena he needs to fill for the 2010-11 season.
Kilkenny must weigh these factors: Does taking Oregon to the Elite Eight twice in eight years and sporting a spotless graduation rate earn Kent a one-year mulligan with a talented but undeveloped freshman class? Kilkenny will certainly fire women’s coach Bev Smith, and sending two basketball coaches out on the same train isn’t very common.
And it’s no slam dunk that Few will leave Gonzaga, where he has job security and has remained among the nation’s elite.
Let’s put it this way: Today, Kent had better beat Oregon State, which has gone from 0-18 in the Pac-10 to 7-8 in one season under new coach Craig Robinson, President Barack Obama’s dynamic brother-in-law.
Dave Leitao, Virginia, fourth season, 9-16, 3-11 ACC, 62-58. AD Craig Littlepage hasn’t gone public, but privately he has told people Leitao will return. Entering Saturday, Virginia was last in the ACC in scoring defense (72.7), scoring margin (minus-1.4), shooting (.418), field-goal defense (.438), 3-point shooting (.309) and blocks (4.0). The gorgeous 14,593-seat John Paul Jones Arena is only two-thirds full.
Boosters are furious, but Littlepage hated to fire Pete Gillen. He will give Leitao every chance to succeed.
Norm Roberts, St. John’s, fifth season, 14-15, 5-11 Big East, 62-82. The New York City area isn’t producing the huge superstars it once did, but the good recruits it has produced — Levance Fields (Pitt), Devin Ebanks (W. Va.), Corey Stokes (Villanova) — aren’t going to St. John’s.
The only teams with winning league records St. John’s has defeated this season are Bethune-Cookman, Marist, Cornell and Long Island.There were more Orange fans at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday than St. John’s fans.
AD Chris Monasch says Roberts has cleaned up the NCAA mess left by Mike Jarvis and will be back.
Jerry Wainwright, DePaul, fourth season, 8-21, 0-16 Big East, 51-69 overall. AD Jean Lenti Ponsetto said in late January, “I think DePaul has every intention right now of Jerry continuing with our program.” Huh? It’s getting so bad, fans are yelling at Wainwright’s family during games.
Let’s see what Ponsetto says if De-Paul goes 0-18 in the Big East.
John Henderson covers college basketball. Contact: 303-954-1299 or jhenderson@
